The Somewhere Else in Time
by MissingSpoon
Summary: The Deepstalker minds his lonely retirement; year 41 after conviction.


I awake to the cool drip of silence. I still my breathing, counting the fearful cycles of quiet until I hear the distant rumble of my herd and I can relax. It washes off me in a wave and with the weight of my continued survival easing off me I pull my hairy arse out of bed; two feet planted on the mossy floor beneath my cot.

My joints hurt, my tired bones are getting too old to live this life with the panache I once did. I glance over to the small fairie fire rod sitting erect on my zhurkwood desk. It takes me a moment to process what the roaming magical light represents. Another cycle has come and gone, and she still hasn't returned to me. I feel a twinge of fear at the puddle of my fading mortality to the ocean of her endless youth. I pass by my reflection in the darkness of my hut and regard my gnarled silhouette.

It stares back.

No, I am worth waiting for. Even like this. We've come too far my lady and me. My reflection gives me an 'atta boy' or maybe I'm just that old.

Ironsoul awaits me by the exit into the cavern I call my home; muscle memory coils my withered claws around its haft, the familiar warmth and texture of its enchanted carvings completes me, and I duck out into the damp chill of this fungal ranch.

My eyes cycle in and out of shades of gray as the darkvision finally decides to leave me. The fungus that ascends into the vast spirelike ceiling above me is in the middle of releasing another cascade of its luminescent glowspores. Like moonlit snow they fall from hundreds of meters above, carried on gentle subterranean wind like an enchanted stream that floats above my head. I cherish this moment for I do not get many, and I'm reminded of why I remain in this settled place even after these long years.

Ironsoul extends my aged reach and removes a bucket from a post I can't be bothered to straighten. I begin my daily rounds to inspect the herd; I smile as my empathy quests towards the Rothe in my stewardship, their drowsy at-ease met with curiosity at my probing. Collectively they remind themselves I am a friend, but it does not come naturally, looking the way that I do. I come to stop next to my newest favorite, a calf born only a few cycles ago. She sniffs at my bucket and I grit my teeth as Ironsoul helps me descend to a crouch beside her. I feel a skeptical resistance and direct my calm towards the mother. She is placated by images of dark, open spaces bountiful in forage.

From inside my bucket I give the calf a few hunks of carved ripplebark. She chews it with naïve haste and I run my calloused digits over her coarse mane. A sad thought from a far away place suddenly; I'm reminded of my old companion and wish the hound could have joined me somewhere like this, but it was not in our stars. The greedy nudging from the calf reminds me of my duties. A chiding sigh escapes me as Ironsoul redoubles its efforts to see me stand again accompanied by a large pop of some joint or another.

Two more weeks. That's all I have left here before I need to migrate them back into greener pastures for another few seasons. My small fungal hut lists at an angle that would have driven a younger me to action, but I'm content to let it rest against its old rotten cap.

I pass by the lean-to that serves as my shed. The litany of unfinished projects I've laxed on before migration stare me in the face. Suddenly they speak up of their importance. I grumble and dismiss them with a wave in a way only an old man can. Ironsoul saves me from bending down to retrieve a harness yet to be mended; one of the young rothe must have bumped it off my workstation. I see the pile of my old enchanted equipment in disrepair.

" _Tomorrow."_ I give them the heads up that I might get something done. They do not protest.

I glance about my vast empire and work at something stuck between my teeth.

Time for a rest.

I sit in my special chair and suck on a dried nugget of barrelstock, watching my herd until I drift off to sleep. What did I need to do this cycle? I'm... I'm sure it can wait.

It does.

A scream. A shrill, piercing scream! My scream? It wakes me up.

Sharp intake of breath I lurch forward too quickly, I feel it in my back, frantically I spot-check the animals before me. Nothing. They're undisturbed but for sensing my own sudden onset of anxiety. It was just in my head. I lean back into my comfortable seat with a sigh.

Just in my head.

In my head.

My head.

Oh gods I can feel it. A probing whisper, unwanted touch, not your lover. I rise like an automaton, quarterstaff in hand as I stalk forward on screaming joints towards the faint hum in my minds eye. It moves, and I move with it, spinning to deepening shadows that aren't there. Iron Will. Still Mind. My training returns to me and things go quiet.

Its too late. I've been made.

Mindflayer.

I stand panicked for too long, excuses parade through my wounded head after the psychic probe. There shouldn't be any this far out; what is it doing; what does it want; how many; why; there shouldn't be any this far out; there shouldn't be any this far out; there shouldn't be any this far out.

Stop. Enough.

I race forward to my equipment, refusing to be cowed, my mellowed rage begins to stoke; asleep too long with this comfortable life. How dare it touch _my_ mind. I will kill it. You're too old to kill it. I will kill it.

My items are in poor shape. I slam my fist into the table and make use of what I can, sliding the wool vest over my tattered smallclothes and fastening rusty vambraces over my scarred limbs. Ironsoul hums to life in my grip, bare feet slap on cavern floor louder then they ever should.

The rothe stir at my entropy but I urge them to calm with my questing will. My elbows grow slick as I crawl through their muck to reach the center of the small herd. They sense it now and group tightly into a defensive cluster, waiting to fight or flee.

I am rothe now, I intertwine my heart with theirs and cling to their experience as the only thing to stop this freefall. Danger, hunger, mate, new smells, comforting smells. Alien smell.

Dropping down like the third act of a play the monster descends on unseen wires to visit us on the stage. Its silent form levitates over my herd, its milky-white tentacles twitching in a bulk mass of aberrational horror.

Silent it moves over to my hut, we feel together the blast of psychic energy it runs through my home. Slowly it spins towards us and my herd gets its first taste of the Far Realm, eighteen animal minds recoiling as one as the illithid makes contact.

I follow the herd leader, giving myself to their collective wisdom. Danger, hunger, mate, new smells, comforting smells. Alien smell. I cling to it and I cling to it. I pray to whatever cruel gods will hear me, I pray to Toril herself and demand she square up on my sacrifices.

I chance a look from between my jittery beasts, their brown hair blocks anything but the faintest of views, I rise slowly until I can see the creature's horrific, consumptuous eyes.

We tense and recoil from another burst of psychic energy and the creature lifts off into the ceiling of the cavern and exits stage left through the crevice into larger reaches. The curtains close.

Tears poor from my eyes as I collapse back into the muck beneath my beasts, it doesn't take long for them to return to business as usual, but I tremble and shake and battle the knot in my mind too fearful to let my walls slip while this monster is on the loose.

I limp towards my shelter and route around for an old chest buried beneath debris. Potions, carefully wrapped and preserved through my retirement. I find the ones I want, I hold the vial of amber fluid up before the twinkling light of the glowspores above me. I prepare a bandolier and needed materials, stopping to curse my complacency liberally. I'm no where near prepared but time is of the essence, it will taste my mind again and know the route of my deception for what it was.

My naked feet are cold as I wait in the ruin of my shed-now-armory for the monster that does not come. My animals grunt at me annoyed, I've missed their second feed by now. I am alone again. For now.

A poor farmer I become, unhooking the rope to the lichen field I was saving for our final week, but it would keep them occupied while I was gone.

I take a final look back over my shoulder to my home before wrapping the old displacer beast scarf about my neck and make to depart the cavern.

I probably should have left her a note.


End file.
